PORCH PONDERINGS

Car Wreck

PROMPT May 22nd

Write about the biggest challenge you have faced and how you overcame it.



Perhaps I shared this before. I was in a bad car accident in my 20’s. I remember driving out of the parking lot of our apartment. For some reason I left our daughter, age 2 at the time, at home. Good decision.

The next thing I remember is hearing a lot of noise. It woke me up and bothered me. Why so much noise? It was all those machines that were monitoring me, keeping me alive.

I was in the intensive care of the local hospital. I had been in a car accident, a bad one. My car, a Ford Pinto, red, 2 door, was totaled. I had multiple injuries, but the worst was a fractured pelvis.

It seems that I went through an intersection on my way to the grocery store. A truck hit me broadside, pinning me in the bucket seat of the car. They say it took some time to get me out. I have no memory of this. I do remember later going to look at the mangled car. It was amazing that I survived. But then the Pinto was poorly designed.

Six weeks in the hospital, not being able to move. Seems you can’t do much for a fractured pelvis other than let nature take its course.

The only bright moment of the whole ordeal was when a woman came in to turn me and rub my back. Heaven!

I did, of course, finally get out. A big bruise on my thigh still gives me trouble to this day. Fifty years later.

The only thing I thought of while in the hospital all those weeks was getting out. Seeing my daughter again. Walking again. Now that I look back on it, seeing my husband again was not a priority. Interesting. But then, he never came to visit me in the hospital. My parents came once. Again, interesting.

So when I remarried and husband #2 was in the hospital for an extended time, I made sure I was there daily. And when current husband was in the hospital, I made sure I went to visit him as well.

It is important to me that loved ones are shown support and love. No matter where they are. But especially if they are sick or injured. I wish someone had visited me back when I was alone and injured.